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The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Direct-Caterpillar77 on 2025-04-19 04:02:02+00:00.
I am not The OOP, OOP is u/ComputerLich
My (23M) girlfriend (23F) is making DnD sessions not fun for the group I run games for.
Originally posted to r/relationship_advice
Original Post Jan 24, 2020
Hello,
I was not sure if this would be better posted on a sub that deals more with the table top RPG, Dungeons and Dragons, but I am in need of advice.
My girlfriend and I have been dating for about 11 months now and things have been pretty good between us. We have had a few ups and downs, but nothing serious. She and I both love the game Dungeons and Dragons, and so I had invited her to join the group I run games for. It is, or rather was, a nice way for us to bond. Shortly after inviting her to join in on my games some stuff happened with her grandparents and her family was going to move out of town to a location that is about 3-4 hours away. Neither of us wanted to do a long distance relationship (I had a bad experience with one anyways) so I let her move in with me. Since I am a student and my income would not support the both of us, she got a job on the campus I go to.
Well, shortly after she started working I had noticed her attitude and behavior change drastically. At first when things did not go her way in the game she would joke “I’ll have you sleep on the couch”. Which was said in a joking manner, so everyone found it kinda funny. She never would force me to sleep on the couch, so I did not mind it. A few months later she became easier to upset during the games and would argue specific decisions I made for the sake of the game. Most of the time, they were small and did not really effect the game or anyone’s fun. Other times her arguing would completely halt the game as I would have to stop and read the rules out to her saying exactly why something was decided that way. During this time she continued to say stuff similar to “I’ll have you sleep on the couch”, but in a more serious and angry tone. Granted, she never followed through with making me sleep on the couch.
But anyways, this all leads up to last night where I was running a session and she became upset over the number monsters the party had fought that night. After an encounter with a bunch of really weak monsters, the party ran into some wild barbarians who attacked the party. This is when she threatened to make me sleep on the couch if I did not wrap up the encounter fast. I decided to ignore her threat for the time, since I did not want to argue and just wanted to wrap things up for the night. The other party members (most in their 20’s, both guys, girls, and my sister) appeared to be really uncomfortable with her suddenly getting so upset about an encounter that the party could definitely handle. Through the encounter things went well for the group. My girlfriend halfway through the encounter completely shut down after she missed an attack. This in particular upset one of the players (20F) and that player was visibly trying not to burst in anger.
After the session, the player wanted to speak to me alone and told me that my girlfriend’s behavior is making the game not fun for her, but also for pretty much the entire party. She feels that my girlfriend is emotionally abusing me to get what she wants in game. She also informed me that one of the players (17F) explicitly did not want to come because of how my girlfriend had been acting. I told the player that I would talk to my girlfriend about her behavior that night. I did end up having a conversation with my girlfriend about it. She expressed she does not know why she gets so angry.
(quick note: I have observed her behavior when I am not the one running the session and she does not at all act the same when someone else is running the session).
This is where I need advice. She is a wonderful girlfriend and I care about her so much. I never got the feeling that she may be abusive. I do not know if I should kick her from my game, which I feel would just make everything worse. I am just a loss for what I should do, what I should do next. I just do not know.
TL;DR: Girlfriend is making DnD sessions bad for me and the party. I don’t know if I should kick her from the group or try to make things better.
RELEVANT COMMENTS
AhGoAwayOuttaHere
She’s taking the game far too seriously, it’s supposed to be fun.
OOP
That is one of the things I had told her last night. I hope that she sees what I am coming from when I told her that.
~
morgarr
I know it’s gonna suck and be uncomfortable but you’ve gotta just have a straight up honest conversation with her about this. She’s behaving spoiled, entitled, and overall with poor sportsmanship. No one wants to play with someone behaving like that. Explain to her that she’s making other people uncomfortable and that soon she’ll no longer be welcome to play. Hopefully she’ll be receptive, rational, mature and adjust her behavior.
You guys have not been dating long and at this point you’re starting to learn more about the person she is beyond the honey moon stage. Her entitled attitude and abusive language towards you will not be limited to DnD. It will start to seep into other circumstance wherein she doesn’t get her way. So if she flips out and totally non receptive to your respectful approach, consider ending the relationship. And don’t think of it as breaking up because of a game, think of it as breaking up because she has a shitty attitude and uses anger to get what she wants. You sound like a kind dude, you don’t need that shit
OOP
I will try to see if that attitude starts showing up outside of games. So far I have not really noticed it. She tends to be needy if anything, but that for me is not that much of an issue.
Update Jan 29, 2020 (5 days later)
This update is being written the morning after a pretty great session with the group I am running for.
I spoke to her about her behavior and we have worked it out. I did tell her that I really do not want that sort of behavior in my games and she understood. The next few days she kinda moped around because she thought the rest of the party would hate her, but after she talked to them on Discord, she felt better. She told me that she would try to take the games less seriously. The next session we had (which was last night) I made it clear to the whole party about new ground rules I wanted to set. Mostly so that nothing like what happened in the previous post would happen again, but also to make sure everyone knew I was no longer going to tolerate that behavior. The party as a whole seemed on board with it and we got started playing. My girlfriend had some actual fun and the rest of the party also had some good laughs. It personally felt really good to see everything running so smoothly.
My girlfriend after the session asked me how she was and I told her that she was fine and that her attitude in the game was great. It seems to me that she will be trying her best to do better. She did seem interested in possibly talking to a therapist about how stressed she has been feeling. I told her that I would support her either way and if she really wanted to go see one then we would figure something out for her to go.
Thank you all for the advice. It really helped me out with this.
TL;DR: All is well, and looking like it is getting better.
Edit: Thank you for all of your support!
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